A quartet of “tectonic forces” — 5G, edge, hybrid cloud, and artificial intelligence (AI) — are converging and shaping the future of telecom, but operators need open technologies to thrive, IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said today during a MWC Barcelona keynote. 

“As telcos try to balance digital transformation and network modernization, they run into another issue, the issue of proprietary systems with lock-in,” he said. “This is why we at IBM strongly support the development of open technologies and industrywide standards such as the open RAN standards. We believe this is critical for operators to thrive, and for 5G and edge to take off.”

The edge is an extension of the data center that blends pieces of bare metal, virtual environments, private and public clouds to “create an infrastructure that can tackle specific customer demands that traditional IP models struggle to address,” Krishna said. “It’s critical to understand that telecom operators and carriers have enormous potential to harness the power of 5G and the edge, not just as a connectivity solution but as a business services platform.”

Following an initial focus on virtualizing key network functions, operators are adopting new approaches wherein Linux, containers, and Kubernetes lie at the heart of network transformation efforts, Krishna explained.  

“This is a large undertaking” that allows carriers to better control the network core, radio access network (RAN), and the edge network, he added. 

Open Tech Enables Telco Competitive Advantage

However, an open framework and set of principles is key to realize that vision, according to Krishna. Open technology provides operators with flexibility, “clarity and consistency to what would otherwise be chaos” in a common foundation that spans converged and distributed infrastructure, he added. 

“Open technologies and standards are key enablers of competitive advantage. Open gives you faster. Open means access to a vast community. Open means having the ability to deploy apps or services on any infrastructure,” Krishna said. 

More than 150 operators use IBM Red Hat technology today, including 80% of the world’s largest operators, he said. 

Verizon Taps IBM’s Red Hat OpenShift for 5G Core

Verizon is one of those customers, working with IBM to “help build and deploy an open hybrid cloud platform with automated operations and service orchestration as the foundation of its 5G core,” Steve Canepa, global GM and managing director at IBM Communications, announced in a blog post today. 

“Today we are integrating IBM’s telco network cloud into Verizon’s service orchestration platform and helping Verizon benefit from running on Red Hat OpenShift,” Krishna said during his keynote. “It will bring agility, automation, and elasticity to Verizon's core 5G network. That helps drive down costs, improve time to market, and improve service.” 

Verizon’s 5G standalone core is still under development. The operator previously said some traffic would hit that core before the end of 2020, followed by full commercialization in 2021, but it hasn’t shared any updates on that effort. 

IBM last year hoisted IBM Cloud for Telecommunications, a new umbrella for its open, hybrid cloud technology targeting 5G network operators, and more than 40 partners have joined the platform to date, according to Krishna. 

He also announced the release of IBM Cloud for Network Automation, a suite of artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities for 5G and edge services. The offering, which runs on Red Hat OpenShift, can speed up service delay from days to minutes, Krishna said. “Operators can now use AI-powered automation to stand up and manage networks quickly, rapidly scale new services, and improve response times by up to six times.”

IBM called out network lifecycle modeling, intent-driven orchestration, automated service design and testing, live views of network performance, and zero-touch operations as key features of IBM Cloud Pak for Network Automation.

“The reality is that operators are at a crossroads,” Krishna said. “They think they have to make a choice between two futures — a closed future and a future that’s open, a future where you can control your own digital transformation journey, and a future that can benefit from all the innovation of hybrid cloud, artificial intelligence, open technologies.”